S-R Media, The Spokesman-Review and Spokesman.com are happy to assist you. Contact Customer Service by email
or call 800-338-8801

LEWISTON – The beginning of preseason camp is all about adjustments. Like the one Deone Bucannon made earlier Friday on the bus prior to Washington State’s first practice. Yes, the Cougars are taking buses to (middle) school for now – big, yellow ones, just like the old days. “It brought me back a little bit,” Bucannon said. “You know how you have to push the things to open the window? I was trippin’ out.”For good reason. Those things almost never work.Next year, WSU will move into what is expected to be a state-of-the-art football operations building, the construction of …

You have viewed 20 free articles or blogs allowed within a 30-day period. FREE registration is now required for uninterrupted access.

Registration Required

log in to your Spokesman.com account for unlimited viewing and commenting access.

WR River Cracraft

He practiced exactly once as a college player, but Halliday already envisions big things for the freshman receiver from Trabuco Canyon, Calif.
“I’d say River’s going to be in a place to battle for a starting position,” Halliday said.

LEWISTON – The beginning of preseason camp is all about adjustments. Like the one Deone Bucannon made earlier Friday on the bus prior to Washington State’s first practice.

Yes, the Cougars are taking buses to (middle) school for now – big, yellow ones, just like the old days.

“It brought me back a little bit,” Bucannon said. “You know how you have to push the things to open the window? I was trippin’ out.”

For good reason. Those things almost never work.

Next year, WSU will move into what is expected to be a state-of-the-art football operations building, the construction of which is taking up some serious space on the Cougars’ practice field.

So they’re practicing here at Sacajawea Junior High, a spacious locale with thick, natural grass fields – a space larger than the entirety of Rogers Field – and plenty of space for WSU to conduct its business.

After the conclusion of Friday’s camp opener, players joked about the modest confines of their camp destination – a residential neighborhood is situated only feet from the field where the offense practiced — though they seemed plenty OK with it.

“I just heard we were coming to a middle school. I was like, all right,” said sophomore receiver Gabe Marks, laughing. “Typical Leach. Come to a middle school. Pac-12 team. Let’s have camp here and not at our school.”

He said he enjoyed playing on grass and added: “I used to go to Cowboys training camp (in Oxnard, Calif.) when I was younger, and it looks like that.”

And while nobody will mistake the Cougars for the Cowboys, coach Mike Leach said he thought this first day exceeded the performance he saw at the start of last year’s camp.

“We got here this morning and kind of didn’t miss a beat,” Leach said as a bus full of his players roared away, back to the dormitories at Lewis-Clark State College. “Our transitions will get quicker. We’re not used to quite this much space, so it’s kind of fun to have it. I thought it went good.”

The defense seemed to get the better of the offense for a good part of the day. But that may have been due to the fact that the offense ran only two or three different plays throughout the team session and 7-on-7 drill, and with players wearing just helmets and shorts – they can’t wear pads yet – running the ball was problematic.

Leach said the offense ran “an awful lot of verticals,” and that their completion percentage on such routes worked out to a number more than 50, whereas last season’s day-one mark was somewhere around 35.

But the highlights were mostly defensive. Junior defensive lineman Toni Pole busted through for a pair of quarterback “sacks,” and Damante Horton snagged a clever interception off quarterback Connor Halliday when he batted the ball away from Marks and into his own hands.

“It was definitely a good day for the defense,” said Bucannon, a senior safety. “We went out there and did everything we wanted to do – fly around, and that’s what Cougar defense is about, flying around, getting to the ball and creating turnovers.”

Bucannon didn’t mind practicing on grass, though he said it took some getting used to.

“It’s deep, and you have to make sure you pick up your feet or you’re going to slip getting in and out of your cuts,” Bucannon said. “For the most part you make your adjustments and it’s not too bad. It’s nicer landing on it, falling on it.”

But WSU certainly won’t break any land-speed records practicing here.

“This is a certifiably slow surface. I don’t know if there is a slower surface,” said Leach, who then launched into a story about his days coaching at Kentucky, and how speed-laden SEC teams would complain about the length of the grass at UK’s stadium.

“The way I’ve always looked at it, one surface may be fast, one surface may be slow, but the fast guys are still faster than the slow guys, so there’s a relative quality to it.”

Notes

Junior linebacker Chester Su’a was not at practice, though Leach said “we’re only talking about the guys that are here, so that will have to remain a mystery.” The coach said the same of offensive lineman Matt Meyer, who was the only incoming freshman not present. … Senior offensive lineman John Fullington, who spent most of the spring practicing with the No. 2 unit, worked mostly with the No. 1 group on Friday.